The New York Times is likely to announce a metered payment model for its website within weeks, according to a widely cited report from New York Magazine. If the report is correct, readers would be able to view a few pages before being prompted to subscribe. The motivation is clear: online ad revenues aren’t enough to replace plummeting revenues from the printed page. Opinion is divided on the matter: online readers are accustomed to free content, and the New York Times competes with all sorts of outlets (including blogs like this one). Erecting paywalls may drive readers toward these free outlets and sacrifice reach in exchange for maintaining revenue. Putting some content out of reach also threatens the newspaper’s “link revenue” – Google’s PageRank is a currency of sorts that drives attention

and traffic, but bloggers cannot link to articles they can’t read. Critics could also also cite the fact that Times’ first attempt at building a paywall – TimesSelect – was a failure. Yet if readers are ever to be sold on the payment model, which the WSJ claims is working in that instance, little time remains to change user behavior. Proponents might also argue that maintaining revenues is critical to keeping quality high. What do you think? Would you become a subscriber if the NY Times website began to charge? Will You Pay for The New York Times online? ( online surveys ) Tags: new york times , pay , Times

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New York Times Website May Charge: Will You Pay? [POLL]